i've got a war in my mind
by words end here
Summary: She assumes the role she was born to play; Queen of the Upper East Side; twenty three and engaged. Future-fic. Dan/Blair. Minor CB/DS/NS. Oneshot.


**A/N: **What I think one of the worst things that can happen to a person is this: you live a life which technically has everything you thought you wanted but in the end, it doesn't live up to the hype. It's a creeping emotion, one I see Blair enduring with Chuck. With Dan, their love brought an unexpected happiness, it was unforced and natural chemistry. This is a future-fic, set after the finale. ALSO I am completely ignoring the crack-iest storyline in history; Dan Humphrey as GG. _Really Humphrey? _You compared Serena (supposedly your 'great love') to Lindsay Lohan? You sent all those tips to yourself? You actively shipped Nate/Serena as the 'golden couple'? Bitch please.

Warning: This story involves mentions of domestic violence, between CB.

* * *

_Been tryin' hard not to get into trouble, but I  
I've got a war in my mind_

Lana Del Rey, _Ride_

* * *

Somewhere along that summer, when Chuck emerges from his war on his father victorious, Chuck tells Blair that maybe they should have a _real _wedding. A ceremony; a spectacle.

"Let's celebrate the fact that we're _finally_ at the same place, at the same time." He says with a genuine smile, his hand heavy on the small of her back. He clinks his champagne flute against hers.

Blair doesn't reply with a 'yes.' She doesn't have to. Chuck's lips are on hers and she finally has her fairytale.

As Chuck slips the ring onto her finger (Harry Winston; like he had always planned), Blair has images of _Breakfast at Tiffany's _playing on a reel inside her head.

She considers Chuck's words. There's one line of dialogue from the film that she remembers vividly, one piece of Audrey's advice that she keeps hearing: _we belong to nobody and nobody belongs to us._

* * *

She assumes the role she was born to play; Queen of the Upper East Side; twenty three with an almost obscene size of a ring on her finger.

Eleanor's eyes light up. She gushes over the ring and Blair is trying on dress after dress to see which one fits this particular life.

Blair only wants to marry once; she wants forever. She wants two children and no more. She wants to give this marriage everything, as if she ever gave Chuck any less.

So she tries to push all the accomplishment, all the recognition, and all the satisfaction she once wanted away somewhere unspoken and secret.

This is what she signed up for – _I will stand by you through anything._

She studies herself in the mirror wearing Vera Wang, and glances at Serena swirling the strawberry in her champagne. Their reconciliation was almost unspoken. Throughout all the arguments, nothing really changes the fact that they forgive each other, that they are too entwined to cut each other out. Part of her perfect picture always involved Serena as her matron of honour. She has read this story in her dreams multiple times, with terms like _fate a_nd _full circle _written in the margins of her mind.

"What do you think, S?" Blair hates the small fact that she has to ask. She wonders if they broke themselves beyond repair this time.

"If you're happy, then nothing else matters, B." The way Serena smiles conceals none of her exasperation.

Blair tells her mother to give her and Serena a moment, to which Eleanor raises an eyebrow and says no more. Serena sets down her glass, like she knows exactly what's coming to her.

"You know, you never really offered an apology." Blair begins in her haughty, high-school tone. "But I let it go, because it's _you, _S. All I've ever done is let things you do slide, because you're my exception."

"B, I –

"Don't. I don't want any excuses. I just want my best friend to muster some enthusiasm for my wedding. But I forgot that it isn't all about _you, _so clearly it's too much to ask."

And then, Blair starts sobbing, almost manically. She tries to force Serena away – tries to slap her pretty blonde head, but the taller girl's arms find their way around her smaller frame any way. When she falls to the floor, the dress pools around her and she has nothing to wipe away the mascara stream left on her face.

"I'm sorry B. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." Serena says it like a mantra, like if she chants it enough, she can go back and not sleep with Nate and not run away and fix everything. "You're going to hate me after I tell you this. You're going to hate me again. But I'm not sure this is right for you."

Immediately, Blair recoils.

"Blair –

"Why can't you just be happy for me?"

"Blair, what if he feels suffocated by this kind of commitment – _again. _You will both be too much for one another all over again and we're not in high school anymore." Serena says.

Blair replies; "We're both in the same place." _Perhaps the same can't be said for you and Humphrey, _she thinks, and she must have thought it out loud because Serena's eyes flash with a familiar type of hurt.

"Blair..." Serena sighs. "Within the space of a year you got married, lost a baby, and left Dan. I want you to be sure you're ready for this. It isn't just about Chuck being ready."

Serena swallows the strawberry in her champagne and departs.

Blair doesn't register much of that sentence. She stops thinking at _left Dan._ In an e-mail like they were fourteen year olds. A quick and careless _I'm sorry. _She remembers the phrase w_e had fun _amongst the other array of stock break-up excuses and clichéd lines she knows he'll never forgive her for.

* * *

Dan sees her once, when he's getting coffee.

When his eyes stop trailing her body, he spots the ring on her finger, and he cannot stomach it.

He thought all it took to let go was a summer with Georgina Sparks.

He thought all it would take was writing stories about Serena – rediscovering his first love.

(He knows he's still lonely boy for a reason.)

So he promptly leaves. He isn't quite sure if he hears his name (a sharp, shrill _Humphrey!_) being called on his way out. Dan has a habit of investing too much hope sometimes; mostly in the Upper East Side.

Humphrey and Waldorf should have remained individual entities.

Two nouns separated by a conjunction.

* * *

Serena reads and re-reads the short story Dan wrote about her, every time the slightest bit of doubt seeps into her head. The version where he's a loner and she's a party girl - so happy and so sad all at once. The version where she's mythologized so much she knows the girl can never live up to the goddess he's created. (She tries.)

So how does she say anything other than _yes, of course I will, _when Dan gets down on one knee?

He has the same fifteen year old boy's hope all over his face and kisses her on the cheek.

She promised forever before, and she'll do it again, he knows, with the same seventeen year old devotion. This is why Dan marries her.

* * *

They have the ceremony. Blair once felt tremors of guilt and regret when people used to say _ChuckandBlair, _but today all she can do is smile.

She stares herself down in the mirror, Serena by her side.

"Are you ready?" She asks.

Eleanor glances at the clock, then adjusts Blair's veil. As if she doesn't look perfect.

"Yes." Blair says, certainty in her smile.

* * *

Humphrey is Serena's plus one. It's to be expected, Blair knows, but he doesn't so much as offer a c_ongratulations. _When she throws him a few glances at the reception, she notices how he is never without a drink in his hand.

Not that his opinion still matters.

* * *

Chuck doesn't tell Blair where they're going for their honeymoon. He just leads her onto his private jet.

She reads the latest _New Yorker _on the flight. And of course, Humphrey has to contaminate the fiction section with a short story.

"I read it earlier," Chuck mentions – pouring another scotch. "And I actually liked it." His eyebrows are raised, he's surprised at himself for permitting a compliment.

Blair just rolls her eyes in response. It's a dreary thing, in her not so humble opinion. Two couples who are friends then fight then become friends all over again. One couple is happy; the other is married and miserable. She thinks Dan could be great, that is if he actually wrote _fiction. _And not so subtle name changing doesn't count.

She stares at her engagement ring before Chuck takes her hand.

Hours later, they land in London.

(Irony hasn't managed to escape Blair yet.)

* * *

Serena reads the same short story. Dan doesn't know why he's so anxious awaiting her response. Before he lets her read it he makes sure to mention that he wrote it a long time ago.

"I'm glad you're writing _fiction. _I loved it._" _She tells him over dinner, and Dan smiles with relief.

* * *

Blair always considered herself as a put-a-plan-into-action , control-your-own-future kind of girl.

That's until she pees on a stick and a plus sign appears.

"What are you thinking?" Blair asks her husband after she tells him. He's only been home one day after a trip to Japan and the smell of smoke clings to him – another bad habit he's going to have to shed.

"I'm thinking that I'm the luckiest Bass-tard alive." He replies, and the moment is cheesy enough to convince her that he really has changed.

His arms are around her. "_We _are." Blair rectifies. She's been fixing his mistakes so well.

* * *

She can't deny this: she imagined hair-bands and dresses and shopping with mommy and auntie S.

But then Henry Theodore Bass is born and Chuck smiles – really smiles – for the first time since she told him she was pregnant. He kisses her forehead when she is so weak, vulnerable, a sweaty mess, so far away from _Queen B_.

And she thinks if this moment won't save her marriage, nothing will.

* * *

It's New Year's Eve. But really, it's just an excuse for the Basses to celebrate their new addition.

Blair flits around their townhouse, Chuck's hand never leaves the small of her back. Dan's been trying not to pass judgement for the past year or so, not when Serena and Blair are going through one of their good phases. But this looks a little too much like high school this early in the evening.

There don't appear to be any waiters walking around just yet, so Dan decides to venture into the kitchen to grab some of those salmon puffs Serena likes so much. If he keeps putting that smile on her face, they might forget all the misery that came before _this_ time.

When he glances into the darkened room, he watches Blair, backed into the counter with Chuck's hand clamped around her wrist, seething some words Dan doesn't hear into her face.

He doesn't know what to do with the shock, so he just walks away.

Chuck strides past him with a bare acknowledgement of _Humphrey _and then Dan pauses and decides to go back.

(He stills resents the fact that he could never really leave Blair alone.)

"Blair?" He asks, softness in his tone that he almost doesn't recognise.

"I saw you snooping," she retorts, "Humphrey, just don't go blabbing about this. Especially not to S. What the hell are you doing here anyway?"

"Well, like every other Waldorf function I'm here out of obligation to Serena."

Blair switches on the light, and he thinks she does it just so he can feel the full effect of her mocking facial expression and accompanying eye roll.

"Salmon puffs." She comments, handing him the tray. "You couldn't even wait a few minutes? But then most Brooklynites tend to be barbaric." She smiles sweetly, but he can't even engage in their banter, their tirade of back-and-forth insults that's been one long run-on sentence of the past seven years.

"I'm not the barbarian." He replies quietly. He inspects her wrist before she flinches away, but he still sees that it's lightly bruised before leaving.

He and Serena leave before they initiate the new year. He takes her to Serendipity III for ice cream, asks her if Blair and Chuck are as happy as they look. Serena scrunches her eyebrows and says that they've always been intense. Then they order a peppermint sundae and a coffee banana split and Dan doesn't know how he can feel so young and tired all at once.

* * *

The first time Dan speaks to Blair since that is around six months later at his book launch, which Serena organised.

Blair is reading the blurb on the back of his book before she hears; "Glad to have been graced by your presence, Waldorf."

She turns around to look at him. "It's _Bass _now. In case you failed to notice whilst your head was buried in all those sad little exposés of yours."

But she buries his book under her arms, nonetheless.

Dan glances at her wrist and there are no bruises anymore.

Then before he can comment Chuck appears by her side, congratulating him. Dan doesn't know why he wants Chuck to be jealous of him – Dan Humphrey has found the rare combination of commercial success and critical acclaim that usually make men in suits jealous. He's aware of how egotistical this is, but it doesn't stop him wanting Chuck to be envious, even though he has Blair and a son, even though he has everything.

Blair clings closely to Chuck and he wishes Serena was beside him.

Dan watches the evolution of their fairytale and wonders how long someone can play pretend.

* * *

He's in the same cafe where he always writes (Serena's a distraction – sometimes the good kind, sometimes the worst) when he spots Blair again. He doesn't bother fleeing the scene this time.

"Humphrey." She curtly acknowledges.

"I have a favour to ask, Blair." He shifts to first name basis and motions for her to sit down at the table. She does, with an air of reluctance. He doesn't know if it's feigned or not, but he does know that he misses her friendship – so much – in that moment.

"You know that Serena and I are engaged –

"Don't remind me." She deadpans.

"And the first time we met was at one of your parties - at your place." He continues before venturing to the point, "And I want to marry her there."

Blair's expression softens. "Always the romantic, Dan." He forgot how intimate it sounded when she said his first name. Even the time that's passed between them isn't enough to take all that away for him. He wishes he could forget.

"So that's a yes?" He wasn't expecting a no, but she isn't opposed to the idea as vehemently as he expected.

"Chuck and I had the wedding of the year," she says haughtily, "It's not like S can compete on this one. So yes, it's better that you two keep it intimate." She stands up to leave.

"Thanks, Blair."

"Do I really need to tell you that this is for S?" She says, eyes mocking. "I should say no, after your book. It's a good thing I don't mind being thinly veiled." She smirks and leaves him with his mouth slightly parted in realisation.

* * *

Before this wedding, Blair's standing in front of her bathroom mirror adjusting her scarf so nobody can see the bruise on her neck.

(Two nights ago, his hand was constricting her windpipe, scotch on his breathe, but this is marriage Blair knows, it's leaving and coming back again, it's hurt and resentment. But this is _ChuckandBlair _so it has to mean something, right?)

Nate presses a kiss to her cheek. Chuck swoops up their son into his arms. There's laughter and smiles and then silence as Serena makes her way down the stairs.

Everything looks perfect, so Blair relaxes.

Dan and Serena marry each other in a setting as intimate as it gets – the Waldorf Brownstone, when his eyes met hers for the first time.

She muses on the fact that both she and her best friend have married their high school boyfriends.

* * *

After the vows, and the reception is in full swing, Dan raises his champagne glass to Blair's and mouths _thank you._

She replies by smiling, earnest, at him for the first time in years. She raises her champagne flute, the stem between her pale fingers.

He realises then that this was the first place he had saw Blair, too.

* * *

Nate twirls Serena slowly, and Dan asks Blair to dance.

To his surprise, she doesn't protest. She places her hand on his shoulder.

They don't say a thing, at first. Blair wouldn't describe it as an awkward silence. More comfortable.

But she feels Dan's gaze on her skin, full of intent.

And then she has to say something, anything.

"A Humphrey and van der Woodsen pair that are actually happy," she begins, his lips turn upwards, "who could have thought?"

"You still can be, too." He replies. He holds the fabric of the scarf between his fingers.

She doesn't say _I am _before Chuck asks if he can cut in.

* * *

It strikes Blair by page one hundred that Humphrey is still writing about her.

Firstly, she wonders why Serena never notices, or at least pretends not to.

Then Henry approaches his mother, a frown on his face. His happiness lags when Chuck's leaves, this time to Europe.

Her son is wearing a purple bowtie. She wraps her arms around him.

(How does she tell her husband that he is becoming his father without realizing it?)

There's another bruise on her neck, same spot as last time. She wears a turtleneck to conceal it.

(How does she leave the castle she has always wanted to create?)

* * *

Serena and Dan are spending the morning lounging around in bed, light kisses and chocolate covered strawberries, when she asks him who the book was about.

"If I say _nobody we know, _would you believe it?" He replies, abashed. She shakes her head and then smiles.

"I just want you to be careful." She replies. "We're all finally on good terms and I know that Chuck and B make an interesting pair. But how would you like someone speculating on our marriage like this?"

His eyebrows scrunch together. "Serena, anytime there's an unhappy pair in my stories everyone just assumes it's _them. _That's not my fault. This is fiction. I don't care what anyone else thinks but I need you to believe that."

Serena nods slowly, he watches her eyes move away from his in guilt, and he doesn't know when they started lying to each other again. "I just worry about her." She admits. "Chuck is always gone. Any time I bring it up she changes the subject."

Dan isn't prepared for what's coming next.

"You two had a friendship, once." Serena suggests before getting dressed.

* * *

Dan likes to think he arrives at Blair's home along with Serena, with DVDs and wine, it's out of some kind of twisted husband's obligation.

When she hugs her friend with a _hey, S, _and looks at Dan first with bewilderment and then with amusement, he knows it's out of much more than that.

* * *

The film watching at the Bass' home becomes a weekly thing. Until Serena decides that Blair and Dan always talk too much, instead of watching.

"I don't want to be there without you." Dan protests.

"Really? Because I think you and B have a lot of fun whilst I'm trying to watch movies. _Go._" She commands, bidding him goodbye with a kiss on the cheek.

When he arrives, Blair looks at him and laughs, leans against her doorframe. "We don't have to do this, Humphrey."

He knows he should go home to his wife.

And he doesn't have the answer as to why he still wants to save Blair Waldorf.

He tells her to choose the film.

It's never Audrey anymore.

* * *

When the credits start rolling, Blair says "He's coming home tomorrow."

"I'm aware that I'm disposable here, Blair." He smiles. It's funny, he thinks. How if he said that five years ago it just would have been bitter.

They're on her couch, her head on his shoulder. It's not really dangerous territory, he thinks.

"I don't want you or S to mention any of this." She replies. Her tone isn't commanding, high school Blair. For the first time in so long, this feels like _his _Blair. The one who he spent months wondering ever really existed, or was just another version of a character he conjured in his head. The one he still writes terrible short stories about. "It would only hurt him." She adds.

"And then he'd hurt you." Dan allows the words that have been locked behind his tongue and teeth for so long out.

Blair attempts to slap him, but he catches her wrist. He folds up the sleeve of her shirt.

Then he presses a kiss to a bruise on her left wrist. And then her cheek. And then her lips.

And then he leaves.

* * *

He arrives home to Nate drinking his beer, tie loosened, Serena sitting beside him.

"Hey man. How is she?" Nate asks.

"Chuck's coming home tomorrow." Dan replies, like that explains everything.

Serena glances from her husband to Nate.

He doesn't know whether to be happy or jealous that his wife has someone to watch movies with now, too.

* * *

Serena tells him that she wants children, placing kisses down his jaw.

"Right...now?" Dan asks. He's thought about it. It's the next logical step. And he's her husband – he wants her to be happy.

He doesn't know if he's ready for that.

"Maybe we should wait. You love your job." He reminds her.

"I love you." She says simply, "And I've been waiting."

"I just don't want everything else to fall by wayside right now." Dan admits. "And we're having a lot of fun, waiting."

Serena drops his hand and looks angry at him, for the first time since they've been married, Dan notes. "Dan, we had a long engagement. Three years long. I don't want to have to wait that long again. Anything could change between now and then."

Dan knows she's right. So much already has.

* * *

They spend that summer in the Hamptons; the two married pairs and then, Nate. Jenny and Eric visit.

Blair makes a comment to Serena about how she and her husband need to hurry up and give Henry a new friend. Serena just sips her drink and Dan eyes shoot over to Blair's. Her sunglasses are perched on the tip of her nose below her eyes. She pulls them up.

She can't hold his gaze for too long anymore.

* * *

"I hope you're keeping my sister happy." Chuck comments once, smug and superior. It's evening and they're waiting on their wives, getting ready to go out for dinner.

Dan finishes his gin and tonic before giving Chuck that matching black eye he's owed him for years.

* * *

At the end of that summer, when they arrive home from the Hamptons, Serena tells Dan that she slept with Nate, once. That she has been falling in love – with Nate.

She apologises, but doesn't ask forgiveness.

He drinks and writes and then drinks some more.

He spends an inappropriate portion of his evenings looking at a blank document.

The only time something appears on the page is when Serena leaves. She kisses him on the cheek before looking at him seriously.

"I think Blair's going to leave him. She's been talking about it for a while now and I want to support her. I just...I think it's a good idea if you and I help her move out."

Dan nods. He knows it's not just Blair's baggage they'll be carrying.

* * *

Blair never cried – not once – during their marriage. If he felt the need to show his strength, then she could show hers. She got so good at pretending everything away, he might leave but he would always come home again, he would bring flowers, diamonds and try to keep buying her the world.

The night she leaves, she wakes up in Serena's bed, the pillow soaked with tears.

* * *

She once attached her heart (a gold pin) to a moss green sweater – a loose tether.

(She always knew it wasn't enough to make Nate hers.)

She once hung her hopes on those _eight letters three words._

(Gradually Chuck struck a line through the middle of them.)

She once ventured to a loft in Brooklyn because he was the person who carried the same weight of love lost and a forgotten fairytale–

(And that night with her head heavy on his shoulder Dan Humphrey gave Blair the only _once upon a time _she has ever truly believed in.)

* * *

Tonight, she finds herself in Brooklyn once again, hoping this time they can do the same together.

End.


End file.
